The leader of Ontario’s New Democratic Party Andrea Horwath sat down with Global News anchor Angie Seth to explain her party’s plans to capitalize on the momentum circling it ahead of the spring election.
“We’re having reports back from our campaign that people are running out of signs, that volunteers are pouring through the doors, donations are pouring in the doors and that’s very, very positive,” Horwath said on Sunday. “So, it’s keeping everybody very energetic, very positive and it’s the very beginning of the campaign really.”
Horwath hopes that this “energy” keeps the party going right to the end of the campaign June 7.
A previous Ipsos poll conducted exclusively for Global News in early May found that Ontario PC Party Leader Doug Ford would receive 40 per cent of the decided popular vote, with Andrea Horwath‘s NDP receiving 29 per cent and Kathleen Wynne’s Liberals 26 per cent.
This marks the third time Horwath will lead the New Democrats into a provincial election and she said this campaign, like every other, is different.
“This campaign people are pretty disappointed, they tell me with the Kathleen Wynne premiership. I mean, folks are saying they want a new premier’s chair which again is different than last time around.”
She said this campaign is about showing voters they don’t have to keep choosing between the Liberals and the Conservatives.
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“There is another option and that this time around they should consider doing something completely different and consider the NDP because we have a plan — unlike Mr. Ford — that is about hope for every day families.”
Horwath also touched upon some controversy surrounding NDP MPP Paul Miller.
A voicemail left by the Hamilton MPP in October 2016 to a member of his office staff, Todd White, in which he can be heard questioning the Canadian Office and Professional Employees International Union (COPE) that represents NDP staff at Queen’s Park, surfaced in mid-April and has raised eyebrows.
White, who is also chairman of Hamilton’s public school board, was on parental leave for 10 months in 2016 and one of Miller’s complaints was that White didn’t stay in touch during that time. White has filed a grievance with COPE over his treatment by Miller.
Horwath said she has remained somewhat quiet on the situation due to the fact that the party has a unionized workforce at its constituency offices, as well as at Queen’s Park.
“When workers have, or when your staff have any problems or concerns they go through a … grievance process,” she said, “and that’s what is happening and we have to allow that process to unfold to determine, you know, where to go from there.”
READ MORE: 2018 Ontario election promise tracker: Here’s what the Liberals, PCs and NDP have pledged so far
The NDP revealed its platform — called “Change for the Better” — in mid-April which promised free child care for families earning less than $40,000 and a boost to hospital budgets if elected, but said they would run multi-year deficits to pay for their plan.
The large amount of spending, Horwath said, is due to the party having to “fix the damage that’s been done by Kathleen Wynne and the Liberals.”
“I mean, we have hallway medicine in our hospitals where people are lined up in stretchers in the hallways, we have families that can’t make ends meet in this city …,” she said. “What we’re saying is we are going to make some investments to give people a break.”
The NDP plan to run a “modest” deficit for the first couple of years, cut that down in year four and five and get to a balanced budget by year six or seven.
“One of the things again that’s different between our plan and what the Liberals have brought forward is that we are going to ask the wealthiest, the richest Ontarians and the richest corporations to chip in a little bit more to help us achieve these goals.”
The NDP’s focus is on middle- and low-income families and offering voters something different than what the Liberals have offered since coming into power 15 years ago.
“They want a change and so they have to look at what that change looks like,” Horwath said.
“And what I’m offering is hope for the future where families can build a better life, where we can set up the next genetaion as well for prosperity and where you can count on a government that will put the people of the province at the heart of every decision that gets made.”
—With files from The Canadian Press, Ryan Rocca and Angie Seth
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